Béla Bartók was born 1881 in Nagyszentmiklós, Austria-Hungary (now Sânnicolau Mare, Romania). He was a child prodigy who began to play the piano at the age of 4. He was taught first by his mother.

He gave his first public recital at the age of 11, including one of his own pieces: "The Course of the Danube." He was later taught by a former student of Franz Liszt.

He was accepted into The Royal Academy of Music in Budapest, and his studies here greatly influenced him. It was at this time he met his lifelong friend Zoltán Kodály.

The summer of 1904 was a turning point for Bartók . While on holiday that summer, he overheard a woman who was employed as a nanny singing folk songs to the children she was caring for. It was because of this event that Bartók devoted his career to collecting and documenting folk music.

After his graduation from the Royal Academy, Bartók stayed on as Piano Professor there. This position allowed him the freedom to study folk music. With Kodály, he traveled into the rural areas to collect this folk music and to document it.

Bartók  was married In 1909 to Márta Ziegler, and together they had a son in 1910, Béla II. Bartók converted to Unitarianism in 1916.

These were dangerous times politically in Hungary. The Revolution in 1919 proclaimed the Hungarian Soviet Republic, the first Communist government in Europe. This government failed only a few months later.

With these events in mind, it was in 1911 Bartók wrote his first and only opera, Bluebeard's Castle, which he dedicated to his wife Márta. When it was deemed as unworthy by the Hungarian Fine Arts Commission, Bartók rewrote it. His librettist was Béla Balázs, who had been blacklisted by the new government, and Bartók was asked to remove his name from his opera. This event had a lasting impression on Bartók. He wrote no more operas after this time and in fact, did not begin to write music again until after World War I in 1914. During this time, he collected more and more folk music, but World War I forced him to cease these activities as well. Bartók seemed forever scarred by the events at this time of his life.

In 1923, Bartók divorced his first wife and married one of his piano students, Ditta Pásztory. His second son, Péter, was born in 1924.

The political state in Europe did not become any better. When World War II broke out in 1941, Bartók began to plan his escape. He was no supporter of Nazism and in fact, refused to give concerts in Germany and severed all ties with his German publisher. His beliefs and his actions were causing him more trouble. His reputation began to fail. He smuggled his manuscripts out of the country before immigrating to New York City in 1942. Péter joined them, enlisting in the United States Navy. His other son remained in Hungary.

Although Bartók was quite welcome in New York City, he never felt at home there. He became home-sick and his creativity faltered. He was unsure how to live as a musician in the US. He made some recordings with Columbia Records and was granted research money for his folks songs.

It was as early as 1940 that he began to suffer from leukemia, but he was not diagnosed until 1944. Though he was not a member of ASCAP, it was this society who took care of his medical bills the last 2 years of his life. 

Bartók began to work tirelessly on his compositions and getting his folk music in order. He died in 1945 of leukemia with his wife and son at his bedside. Only 10 people attended his funeral, which was officiated by Laurence I. Neale, minister of New York's All Souls Unitarian Church. He was buried in  Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York.

With the Fall of the Iron Curtain and due to his son Béla's influence as the President of the Hungarian Unitarian Church, his remains were sent to Budapest in 1988, and he was given a state funeral with burial in Budapest.